Nine months
by zippizappi
Summary: Hanna hears her biological clock tick and takes drastic action, ensuing nine months of exceptional state in the Rivers' marriage. This... is Haley's story! A multi-chap, rated T/M mostly for language.
1. The first month

**NINE MONTHS**

* * *

 **oOOo Prologue oOOo**

Is it normal to hear your biological clock tick at the age of twenty-five?

The first time I remember feeling that way was last year, after my boyfriend and I got back together following a three-year relationship… hiatus. That's what I like to call it. It was a long period of mourning our breakup, trying out new men and realizing that Caleb is the only guy I ever want to be with after all. I remember I was ready to start a family with him long before we even separated. He was my first true love, and I knew at twenty-one that he always would be. But our crazy work schedules started taking a toll on our relationship at some point and drove us apart for a while. But the moment we shared our first kiss in the process of our reconciliation, I knew that it was meant to be forever. We were meant to be together forever… as a family. We quickly became husband and wife after that. Us getting married was something I never dared to imagine when I first got together with Caleb. We both come from broken families, and marriage just hadn't been the right concept for both our parents. So why did we take the plunge anyway?

It's simple. Because that's what you do when you're facing a long prison term for murder. At least, back then I thought I was. However, that is a different story.

But that's when it all started. I wanted to have a family with the man of my dreams… like every woman in love does. And for me, the prospect of losing him got me thinking… and hearing it loud and clear…

Tick tock tick tock…

 **oOOo The first month oOOo**

Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yesyesyesyesyesyesyesyes.

Right there.

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeea-

Aaahhhhhh.

Caleb was touching me in that spot, that certain spot that always drives me crazy, and… and at some point some five minutes later, it must have happened.

I assume.

It was regular, decent Tuesday night sex. Nothing really special. The way it is when you've known each other for eight years and the nights you spent fucking again and again have long – and I mean loooooooong – been replaced by nights you spend actually sleeping.

Somehow I had imagined I would notice it – like making contact with the universe, the primordial mother, the source of life, anything – a twitch in my lower body would have sufficed. Or a kind of strain I usually feel when I'm getting my period. But nope, nothing, nada, nil. I've heard of women who were able to tell when IT happened. Who cannot only tell you the night but also the specific moment IT happened. Who are so in touch with their body and their life that they have a presentiment about _IT_ happening. But those are probably also the kind of women who dance naked around Lake Nockamixon during a full moon, celebrating welcoming their period until they get caught by a ranger or a wild hog… whichever came first.

I am definitely not one of those women.

Yeah.

That's what you get for neglecting your spiritual self for the sake of your cosmetic one.

I'm pregnant.

Expecting.

Knocked up.

Got a bun in the oven.

I'm with child.

I'm in a family way.

You can call it what you want. In any way, it wasn't an accident. Or maybe it was after all and I'm begging you for mitigating circumstances. Every woman will understand. I was twenty-five years and five months old and I was married to Caleb, a software engineer (who's twenty-six and has a butt that even Channing Tatum would envy him for). We had been living together in a loft in Greenwich Village for more than two years. There wasn't much left for us to try out as a couple. We'd done it all, even hiked the Appalachian Trail together. I mean it was natural to take the next step... right?

Tick tock tick tock tick tock...

I had been hearing my biological clock tick for the past couple of months, so loudly that I could barely sleep at nights. At the beginning, I wasn't able to pinpoint all the signs. Instead of fantasizing about my husband's great, yet hairy, sexy ass, I thought of soft, chubby baby butt cheeks. When I held my friend Emily's daughter Lily in my arms, I burst into loud sobs. And when the little girl puked all over my brand new camisole, I didn't dare to bring it in for dry-cleaning for two whole weeks!

In my defense, an article I'd read in the New York Times magazine had also played an important part. It said that women over thirty are far more likely to need medical assistance in conceiving and had to take a ton of hormones in order to become pregnant... like pigs that need to be fattened. And eventually, they would end up getting quintuplets. I didn't want quintuplets. I would have been fairly content with getting just one baby.

And then, there was that incident recently where Caleb didn't come home from work at the usual time because he was stuck in an elevator for a couple of hours while a fire was raging in the building. His cell phone didn't have any service, so I didn't know where he was. I was worried sick, and I remember feeling both frightened and ridiculously sad about the possibility of staying behind lonely again. I thought there was no way that I could go on without having a part of him with me for the rest of my life. That's when I knew for sure that I wanted to have children with him. Soon. Real soon. So, basically… right there that night!

Let's just not dwell on the fact that he had been stuck between first and second floors while the smoke detectors had gone off due to a pizza burning in the oven of the canteen. To me, it had been another life changing event that totally set my biological clock in motion.

Somehow I ended up not telling Caleb about my hormonal state of exception and my sneaking desire to have children. We had discussed the issue elaborately at the start of our relationship — after I'd had the very first orgasm of my life and after I'd taken a tentative drag at my second ever smoke — when I heard myself say to my own horror, "Do you want to have kids some day?"

At sixteen!?

I had no idea how that could have slipped from my lips, for even four-year-old girls know that questions like that at the beginning of a relationship are like a DOA call for every guy out there. Talking about your baby fantasies that soon is worse than admitting to having had an STD before. Nothing leads to a guy catapulting from a sleeping bag like the baby issue.

Caleb had a deafening cough attack and when he was finally able to breathe again, he wheezed, "Um… uhhh... Whoa… Where are you getting this from?"

"Um... uhhh, well...," I managed to say before the unfamiliar air in my lungs forced me to cough it up, which thankfully gave me some time to mull over his counter question. "Just saying," I ended up huffing into his ears in a desperate effort to make it sound as if the two of us were just casually chatting about our favorite smores recipe.

"Uhhh... naturally I'd say I do, yes, but that may be another while. Maybe like... I don't know... twenty or twenty-five years from now. After I've done some more things like maybe getting a real paying job and traveling and...," he cleared his throat meaningfully. "And getting to know you better. That's what I want for now. But if you agree that this... us... here... wasn't just meant for one night only, we might want to consider getting you on the pill. Just to be on the safe side, you know?"

I eagerly nodded my consent, and from there on, Caleb went on to be extra thoughtful. Every single day that we spent together in the years after he asked me if I had taken my pill or he would bring me a glass of water during recess so that I could take it there in school without risking that my mom found out.

So if statistically it takes a year for a woman my age – because hello, twenty-five is almost as old as thirty – to get pregnant, I figured I'd have enough time to warm him up to the idea before his twenty-year deadline was running out. It was only a matter of timing it right. And it wasn't like he'd said he never wanted to have children or that he didn't like them in the first place. I watched the man take care of other people's kids, and it stood to reason that he would be the perfect father one day.

He once babysat my co-worker's five-year old son Russell for me after I'd come down with a fever and was quickly given a restraining order by the parents to not come close to their house for two weeks. Don't blame it on Caleb that little Russell saw dead people everywhere in the months after and had nightmares for days. My husband fell asleep on the couch during _Paw Patrol_ and the boy was quick to switch DVDs, ending up watching _The Sixth Sense_ all the way through until his parents came home from date night later on. I mean he was five years old and had more technical talent than me who cannot even open a DVD box without breaking a nail!

Caleb would be an awesome parent, he just didn't know it yet. His genes matched perfectly with mine if I trusted my nose's instincts. Noses never lie. I fell head over heels in love with Caleb after I'd first smelled his natural scent. And when we first saw each other again after our breakup, he walked past me, and my nose caught a whiff of his aftershave and BOOM, I was back to my old sixteen-year-old self, hopelessly in love with him again, knowing that at that point, it was a long shot because he was dating my best friend then. But well, here we were again, it all worked out for the best and now I got to rest my head in the crook of his neck and smell him and do all the other great stuff with him that he was so, so good at for the rest of my life. But that alone was not how I ended up getting pregnant.

So, silly me, I kind of forgot taking the pill the other day… on purpose… by way of trial... without telling Caleb about it. And unfortunately, that wasn't the end of my conception story either.

Admittingly, I spent my time after our casual Tuesday night sex doing yoga while Caleb was in the shower and getting ready for bedtime. Have you ever tried the lotus pose? In headstand? Because I did! I only wanted to try it out after I'd been watching YouTube videos of a yoga instructor named Nathaniel who performed all sorts of poses with animal names, ending the exercise with his personal masterpiece: inversion with extended arms while his legs were doing splits up in the air.

No need in pointing out that neither was I able to extend a single arm, nor was I anywhere close to get my legs that far down. Plus, the whole thing really wasn't really nice on your eyes if you're naked and looking at a large mirror opposite your bed.

But I did find it awkwardly relaxing to let my upper body dangle over the edge of the bed. It really helped with making cleaning underneath the nightstands and the vanity a priority, too!

I 'd heard that gravity was playing a big part in conceiving. It was even logical as I understood. Maybe nature hadn't noticed that us humans walked on two legs instead of four and so we tend to get up after sex to take a shower or go get a cigarette or a glass of wine. If all women were walking on all fours, the sperm would only have to navigate horizontally. But upwards? Nope, never. Everybody knows how exhausting that can be. I hate climbing, especially in five-inch heels, I prefer using elevators whenever I can. And apparently, so did Caleb's sperm. When I was doing my lotus headstand for beginners by the bed that night, I provided those damn bastards with an elevator, and at least one of his little swimmers used it and even managed to get out on the right floor!

After that night I simply blocked it out and went on with my life. I kept pretending that I was still taking my pill every day when instead, I flushed it down the toilet — feeling like a criminal and the worst wife in the world. But… the genes… the butt… You'd understand if you ever saw it…

I tried talking myself into believing that I was doing the right thing. I mean after all the side effects of taking hormones every day can be a real pain in the ass. Ask men if they were willing to take a pill every day for the rest of their sexually active days. I'm pretty sure they only would do that if the pills made their penis grow by an inch every week.

So the next day, I applied some lipstick and went shopping to make myself feel better. 50 percent off on a new pair of Christian Louboutins. Come on! I almost cried when I saw them in the window. My credit card cried too, I think, and my financial consultant is probably going to send me a letter of complaint later next month. But there is no better cure for a guilty conscience than a new pair of heels. Except maybe two pairs of heels.

And it wasn't like anything had happened, and I swore to myself that I was going to start taking the pill again soon and have a heart-to-heart with Caleb about what he wanted for our future. In the days after, I went out almost every night — sometimes with Caleb, sometimes with one of my friends — and drank about twenty-four Margaritas, three bottles of Merlot and four shots of Tequila. I even bummed a smoke when a girl in the over-crowded ladies' room offered me one while we were all waiting our turn.

My job didn't give me much free time to worry about the after effects of my morning ritual either. I work in fashion, and if you want to make it in the business you have to work, work, work.

My best friend Emily had a party around that time, and everybody who's ever been to one of her birthday parties for girls only knows they're the worst kind. Like boot camp and only the strongest survive. So afterwards, I came home at half past four in the morning feeling like I was dead. All sorts of alcohol had joined my bloodstream, making the world around me gyrate even faster. I don't know how the world does it, I for one tend to get nauseous. So I sat on the toilet, singing "l will survive" at the top of my — raspy — voice when Caleb came in, drowsy. "Hey babe, come on! Let's go to sleep, okay?" He yawned and carefully tried to remove the toothpaste tube from my hand that I had been using as a make-shift microphone.

"No, Idonwantto," I protested with all my might, my tongue feeling extremely heavy.

"Oh, like hell you do. But you have to, and trust me, tomorrow you'll thank me for this."

Caleb slowly pulled me up from the toilet seat while handing me a glass of water which was fizzing from an aspirin that was dispersing inside.

I opened my eyes - and there he was: unshaven and inexplicably good-looking... the most wonderful man in the world and definitely one day… the father of my child. Tears started welling up in my eyes and I quickly put the glass to my mouth.

"You donwannit too but youllbe thangin meee later," I whined into the half-empty glass before I downed the rest.

"I'd be really thankful if you could try and put one foot before the other and come to bed now."

"Can't. I donfeel good. But donyou worry, it's all purrfecly normal… cause I'm pre…-" I didn't get to finish the sentence as a series of hiccups overcame me. And that's when I saw it: there was blood in my panties. Little, maroon blotches sprinkled across the silk material, looking like one of those psych inkblot test pictures my therapist Doctor Sullivan once showed me. But despite its really interesting pattern, there really was only one possible interpretation: not pregnant. "Oh god… oh god… oh godohgodohgod." I stared at my underwear.

Bewildered, Caleb stared at the agitated mess of a woman before him.

"… pretty sure I got my period."

"Figures."

And then I puked all over his favorite sleep shirt.

Somehow Caleb managed to get us both up cleaned up and ready for bed. I love him so much. He has such obvious father qualities.

 **oOOo**

I had an obvious hangover the next morning. I stuffed myself with a tampon the size of a cucumber. Usually, during the first twenty-four hours of my period, I bleed like crazy, so I need the cotton cucumber or I'm stuck with wearing black clothes only and making a run for the ladies' room every half hour. It's so nasty.

All prepped for a little shopping trip, I left our apartment and went to buy a new sexy muscle shirt for Caleb before I headed to work. I was sitting at my desk all morning, my mind constantly wandering off to that one thought.

Not pregnant. Not pregnant. Not pregnant.

Around noon, my mood had significantly worsened, and it was all crystal clear: I was most likely infertile. It had to be the only logical explanation. All those years of fumbling around with a condom when things were getting hot and heavy between Caleb and me… all those times we were scared as shit after we'd forgotten about birth control because things had gotten too hot and too heavy to interrupt in time… all those times I was secretly worried sick because I had actually forgotten to take the pill… I was surprised I hadn't gotten any issues with high blood pressure yet. Also, with all the money we could have saved on birth control… Man, I would have been able to afford that sexy PRADA dress… And not the one from the designer outlet store in New Jersey… the real deal from their store on Fifth Avenue!

At 2 pm, I finished my lunch break feeling like a hippopotamus. I had eaten way too many chicken wings with fries, but a possible weight gain was the last thing on my mind. Let's face it: that was probably the only way I would ever get the look of a pregnant woman. I was convinced that I was severely ill. Cervical cancer, ovarian cancer, bladder cancer… I was sure I had them all. I would never be able to have any children. Never! Over and done with. Before I turned thirty! I would probably end up looking like a female on the outside, but my insides would soon have to be removed.

At 6 pm, I closed my laptop feeling tremendously happy again. I was not pregnant! How awesome was that? My friend Spencer was planning on going to an after work special at a club in SoHo and now I was totally free to join her and have some fun. We'd have some drinks, eat sushi and inhale the thick, musky evaporations of a couple of hundred strangers... Who would want to be pregnant anyway? Ruin their lives with twenty inches of whining and pooping offspring? Refrain from going out, from drinking alcohol, from sleeping in, from having wild and spontaneous sex, from weekend getaways to Long Island, from everything that was fun? Was I completely insane?

I was dead set on going straight back on the pill again, starting tomorrow morning. Whew, what a fluke! Not pregnant. I could go on with my life and my marriage with a clean conscience.

By the time we arrived at the night club, I knew that something wasn't right. During the cab ride there I'd remembered that I hadn't changed my tampon all day. I hadn't felt the urge to do so as I hadn't noticed any signs of leaking. Instead of going inside and ordering my first drink of the evening, I made a beeline for the ladies' room – though that name is quite a euphemism because that was definitely no lady who messed up every single stall in there – in order to check the situation "down there". I don't want to go into detail too much, but one minute later, I held the tampon in my hands by its string… and it looked nearly unused.

This was very suspicious.

That moment, Spencer came in and knocked on the door of the stall. "Hanna, are you alright? You've been away for almost twenty minutes. We're all waiting for you."

I muttered something about a run in my stocking and tossed the tampon into the bin in the corner while listening to the clattering of Spencer's heels as she made her way out. Then I sat down on the toilet seat, waiting for something to happen. It didn't take long before there was another knock. "Han? Do you need some nail polish for your stocking? I can help you out," Aria yelled to drown out the thumping beat of the music that was playing on the dancefloor.

"No, thanks. I'm good," I told her quickly and flushed the toilet, just for appearance's sake. Then I opened the door and smiled at her weakly. When I'd finished freshening up, Aria linked arms with me and lead me out to the rest of the group that was waiting in a darkened corner of the night club. Everyone had their drinks in their hands and they had even ordered one for me. I took the glass, unable to tell what was inside. But the smell was putrid. I pretended sipping at what seemed like a glass of solvent to me and tried to engage myself in some shallow party talk. But I wasn't really paying attention to what anyone else was saying. In between sips, I went to the ladies' room about ninety-two times, checking if I had gotten my period at last. Spencer and Aria kept giving me looks, but I didn't care.

Something was off. Something was in fact very, very off.

Upon my ninety-fifth visit to the ladies' room a guy who was leaning against a condom dispenser and wearing thick black sunglasses came on to me. "Do you want some?"

"Do I want what?"

"Anything."

"What?"

"Come on, drop the innocent act."

"What innocent act?"

"Girl, I got it all right here. And if I ain't got it, I can get it for you," he hissed through gritted teeth and snapped his fingers. "Like that."

I stared at the stranger. "l don't need anything. Nothing. And I don't want anything, especially from you."

"Oh please, babe, don't pretend you don't care. I know you're going through cold turkey. I've been watching you all night, going in and out, in and out, and in again. Makes me nervous, you know?"

"l... uhh... I'm not going through cold turkey, I'm just... I mean I checked... I just had to... you know..."

What was wrong with me? Here I was, trying to explain my period problem to a complete stranger, a drug dealer of all people! And while I stammered and blushed, the guy started smiling and even pulled his sunglasses down.

"Bladder infection! Girl, why didn't you say so right away?" He confidentially put his giant arm around my shoulder. "I'm in the know. My girlfriend has this shit about once every month. If you ask me, it ain't no wonder with what you ladies are wearing these days. You call that a skirt? It's shorter than the duct tape that that bastard plainclothesman used last week to conduct me away." His lewd gaze traveled downward to my legs. I had no idea what he meant. My skirt was almost all the way down to my knees, so basically floor-length.

"Have you ever heard of bearberry leaves? My girlfriend uses them to make tea, and it always seems to help her. Just pour them with boiling water, wait for ten minutes and voilà. Works better than penicillin. My girl swears by bearberry leaf tea. Says it tastes like shit, but hey, it's medicine. It's supposed to taste bad, right?"

I listened as he rambled on, feeling another soothing dose of vodka arrive in my brain. "Okay."

"I just got a fresh badge for her from my herbal guru. It's in my car outside. I can give you some of that."

"l don't think I need any...

"It's for free. Scout's honor!"

With the vodka in my system, slowing down my thought process, I stood there weighing my options. I mean I did tend to get bladder infections about twice a year. I should take precautions. That's just good thinking. In hindsight, I should have known that this guy has never even seen a boy scout in his life, not to mention he's been one himself. But the alcohol made me set one foot before the other, venturing forth with a shady stranger wearing sunglasses in a dark night club.

So I found myself waiting outside in the alley behind the club as the guy — "Call me Walter! That's what all my clients call me" — rummaged in the back of his rusty Volkswagen. When he turned around again, he held up a small plastic bag.

"Here, this should last you at least two days."

I took the bag from him and warily ogled its weird brownish, crumbly contents.

And as far as I can remember that was when the blinding headlights of a police car flared up next to us.

 **oOOo**

At the police station, no one had ever heard of bearberry leaves before. But they were sure they had to be some form of drug, even if they didn't know how they worked. I had to answer an endless array of preposterous questions. It didn't impress them at all that I've had my fair share of legal connections during the course of my entire youth and that I knew plenty of people who could bail me out and represent me in court. I also knew that I was entitled to make a phone call. But damn, Caleb didn't answer the phone! He was probably in the middle of one of those idiotic Fortnite group battles where they didn't even allow anyone to take a leak before the enemy was killed.

Some time later, a drowsy doctor came in and made me pee in a cup. That's how they knew that neither was I having a bladder infection nor a drug problem.

What in the world did I want to do with bearberry leaves in the middle of the night? And why did I accept them from a well-known New York drug dealer?

I was just about to come up with a good answer when Caleb stormed into the police station in order to pick me up. At 3am, he had finally listened to the voice-mail I had left for him.

Walter had to stay a bit longer. They had found a significant amount of other, not-that-legal herbal products in his car. I scribbled down the phone number of Spencer's law office on a piece of paper and gave it to him before I stepped out into freedom again.

Of course, Caleb demanded an explanation. I didn't know what to say so I just remained silent during the cab ride home. In return, he just kept shaking his head scoffing until we pulled up in front of our apartment block. After he'd paid our cab fee, he started talking to me again in a more mellow voice. He asked me if I was having any problems that I hadn't shared with him yet. He also suggested we go to couple's therapy together.

Unfortunately, Caleb didn't believe me when I told him I was having trouble urinating. It wasn't before I told him that Crazy Walter had forced me at gunpoint to come outside to the car with him so he could hire me as his mule for Southeast Asia that Caleb was content. Unfortunately, he wants to sue Walter now for assaulting me, so I have yet to come up with a good story to prevent that. But needless to say, I was pretty relieved when I fell asleep in Caleb's arms that night.

On the next day at noon, I jerked from my slumber. Caleb had gotten up long before me and gone to work even though it was Saturday. My luck is that I have a boss who's a family man with priorities. I usually work almost twelve hours a day for him, Monday through Friday, but weekends are like the Holy Grail for him; no one is allowed to make any appointments on the weekend because that's when he's in his bachelor pad in Montauk, just enjoying life.

I am grateful for a boss with such straight priorities, although I do feel like I should tell his wife why he doesn't spend weekends at home in Brooklyn with her and their three kids anyway…

The first ten seconds after I'd woken up were great. The sun was shining in through the blinds and I lay in bed, thinking about all the things I could do that day. Go shopping? Drive to City Island? Call Aria in London? Visit my mom in Rosewood? Check the bed for blood traces?

Suddenly, I was up, ransacking the sheets for evidence. I slept naked last night, so there had to be some… signs.

But there weren't any. The sheets were as crisp as before. Was I slowly going nuts? I jumped off the bed and checked our hamper in the bathroom, and there they were: my worn-out panties with two tiny speckles of blood. I hadn't simply imagined things. The proof was right there. I was feeling dizzy and kind of in need of a cigarette… or a Xanax.

I walked to the kitchen, looking for my phone so that I could check my calendar. There was a half-emptied glass of red wine on our couch table that Caleb must have left there before he'd gone to pick me up from the police station. Perfect! I grabbed it and downed the warm liquid in order to sedate myself. Everything was alright. After all, periods were likely to be late, especially with all the stress I was experiencing at work with getting my job done on time and helping my boss lead a double life.

Or maybe I was some sort of genetic wonder woman, and this was my menopause announcing its arrival. Oh boy! When was that due again?

I concluded I was a little low on blood sugar, so I quickly got dressed and decided to leave our apartment to buy a large mocha and a donut for lunch at the coffee shop by the corner.

For some reason, I ended up walking past the coffee shop and strolling to the pharmacy two blocks farther down the street. And to my surprise, I found myself inside and waiting in line ten seconds after. When a bunch of grey-haired men had paid for their meds, the pharmacist started tending to an older woman and I was supposed to be next. As I waited my turn, the pile of pillboxes on the counter grew, but the lady still kept asking for more. Pharmacies for old people were probably what Gucci was for me. Once you start shopping there's no stopping you… unless your credit card gets declined at the checkout.

"And then I need those liver drops. They always work so well after I had fried food, but my doctor won't give me the prescription anymore," I heard her ramble, causing the pharmacist to go to the back and open yet another series of drawers. "… the cardiovascular agents, yes. Thank you. And have you packed up the tonic for my veins already? Every time the weather shifts, there's this terrible draft in my legs…"

The young man behind the counter gradually seemed to become happier during the fifteen minutes I spent waiting for the old lady to finish her order. My stomach was growling and my blood sugar was dangerously close to ceasing to exist; my brain was slowly switching to half-sleep.

"… and I think that's it. Oh wait, I forgot about my headaches. So I still need my Tylenol… yes, the fifties pack please… oh and yes, a pregnancy test."

My doze mode ended abruptly. Did she just say pregnancy test? I stared at the woman's back. She had a visible hump and very white hair, the natural version, not the kind of white that girls who are obsessed with Japanese manga literature dyed their hair in. She had to be at least seventy years old!

With no hesitation whatsoever, the pharmacist went to get a pregnancy test and put it in a large plastic bag along with the rest of the lady's purchase. Then she paid – cash!? – and left with a happy smile.

I pondered whether I had traveled in time to a future that offered women of all ages to become pregnant or whether some medical sensation in hormone therapy had taken place and I had missed it despite the fact that I always read my copy of _Vanity Fair_ during lunch hour. But then the pharmacist turned around to me and said, "Hello! How can I help you?" His smile had disappeared. Apparently, I didn't look as needy in the medical department. However, he had noticed the way I was staring after his recent customer. "She'd been wanting to have children for a very long time and it just… never happened," he whispered as I approached the counter. "Sometimes the unfulfilled desire to have kids produces strange effects. That lady comes by once every month, demanding for a pregnancy test. She's one of our most loyal customers, but it's really sad, isn't it? Sometimes, her husband even comes by when she's too sick to leave her apartment." He pulled back and shrugged meaningfully. And I just stood there, dumbstruck.

 **oOOo**

Five minutes later, I was back outside on the sidewalk, staring at multiple boxes of _Trojans_ condoms I was holding in my hand. Believe me, I don't get it either! I swear I tried to say, "I would like to buy a pregnancy test, too," but somehow the words coming from my lips didn't coincide. I was still in shock.

Suddenly, I had that vision of myself that I would be spending the next fifty-ish years buying pregnancy tests every week as naturally as bread and butter.

I did have to admit the pharmacy guy knew an awful lot about all the different varieties of condoms. Plus, he really knew how to sell well; I had just spent forty bucks on birth control that I don't intend on using. Maybe I could donate the boxes to my old high school in Rosewood. The kids there really do seem to need them more than me. If Caleb finds them at home, I could tell him that that's the charity I chose to give to this year. Although, maybe it would be better if he didn't. Better not lose that last smidgeon of my credibility right after he sort of bailed me out of jail for drug dealing.

So, I started walking on and tried giving the condoms to a homeless guy on the street. But he just looked at me with bewilderment and threw the boxes back at me, slurring, "I fucking hate women!" I shoved the boxes into my handbag and hurried to turn the corner.

It took me two more attempts and a subway ride to Midtown before I had finally raised enough courage to buy a pregnancy test and actually take it home with me without tossing it in a dumpster.

Somehow, it was already 4pm by the time I walked back into our apartment. Or rather limped… Breaking in my new Louboutins on my quest to buy a mocha and a donut hadn't been the smartest idea! On my way home, I quickly snuck in at my favorite coffee shop where Rodrigo handed me "my usual" without further ado, thereby enabling me to skip the line and thus sparing me some painful minutes with blisters on my feet. Gotta love that Mexican barista!

 **oOOo**

"You either test in your urine stream or collect a sample of your urine in a clean, dry container. Dip the absorbent tip into the urine pointing downwards for at least 5 seconds. Place the testing stick on a clean, level surface with the result window facing up. Wait 5 minutes. Changes that appear after the stated amount of time will not represent the correct result." I religiously studied the instructions while eating my donut. I was supposed to pee in a container? What kind of container? Reusable plastic cup or my favorite coffee mug for good luck? A shot glass maybe? And how much pee did I need?

I opened our kitchen cabinets and eventually found the ugliest container I could imagine: a creamer with golden ornaments that Caleb had once gotten for his birthday from his aunt Phyllis. I never liked Phyllis or any of the presents she kept sending us. But this one now seemingly got what it deserved.

There are few key moments in a woman's life. Like the first time you get your period, the first time you have sex, the first time you buy a pair of shoes that cost way more than your credit card limit…

Or the first time you're secretly taking a pregnancy test!

I stared at the display window reminiscing about my childhood and feeling confident that my children would surely never have to go through the pain and trouble that I experienced. And then a thin vertical line appeared.

Holy cow! Not pregnant! Not pregnant! Whew, I hadn't betrayed Caleb after all. I could just talk to him about wanting to have kids and maybe he could actually be game.

I jumped to my feet and started dancing around our bathroom, accidentally dropping the creamer in the lavatory. To my dismay, it lay there, unscathed.

I wasn't pregnant. Of course! It was just my period being late a few days. I had become such a hysteric laughing stock. As I stopped my dance of joy for a moment, I suddenly realized something. I was not pregnant. Fuck! That meant I was going to have to go through the exact same situation again next month.

Nah, well. It wasn't like trying to get pregnant was the nastiest pastime in the world. Am I right?

I grabbed the test stick and wrapped it in toilet paper before dumping it into the trash and covering it with the empty tampon box. Just in case. Hah! Then I strolled into our living room. It was time for some chocolate!

 **oOOo**

With two Mars bars in my hand I slouched down on the couch and turned on our TV. Then I started browsing through the Netflix chick flick section. Wait a second! Wasn't there an infinitesimal blue line right across the vertical line in the display window?

Hmm… I shrugged it off.

I made it through the first two minutes of _The Notebook_ before I leaped to my feet and ran back to the trash can to recover my hidden treasure. Yup, there it was. A teeny-tiny-almost-invisible second line that was now forming a cross with the first one.

Yeah, okay. That meant nothing. Nothing at all.

I was nervous and needed to pee again. When I came back into the room, the new, horizontal line had gotten visibly thicker. I quickly grabbed the test and put on my running shoes. It took me thirty seconds to get to the pharmacy where I immediately regretted my decision. Still panting like crazy, I had spotted the same salesman behind the counter that had sold me a year's supply of condoms a few hours previously. But it was too late. He had already made eye contact and started grinning wolfishly.

"Hey there! Already in need of replenishment?"

"No, ehm….. uuhhh…. I'd rather buy a pregnancy test. Actually, all the different brands you're carrying."

The guy stared at me.

"Please?"

"Pregnancy tests?"

"Yup. And could you hurry up? I have to get going."

"Well, that was quick." Wordlessly, he turned around and shook his head as he went to retrieve the objects of my desire. He returned eventually carrying twelve boxes in various sizes and colors. After he had swiped my credit card, he handed me a free brochure: "The first time – sex ed for dummies" and personally chaperoned me to the exit.

 **oOOo**

Another blue cross, a pink cross, a red circle, two parallel lines, several displays that read "pregnant" later, I accepted the relatively likely truth.

I was pregnant. Pregnant. Pregnant.

PREGNANT!

I continued dancing a jig and ended up making havoc of our bathroom. Aunt Phyllis' creamer plunged to the tiled floor and shattered into pieces… which only made me raise my arms into the air in triumph.

And then my brain started functioning properly again. I slowly sank down on the cold tiles and thought about the world we were living in… the dangers of living in Manhattan, the likelihood of another war in the Middle East and me… having lied to my own husband.

How could this happen? To me of all people?

… _to be continued …_

* * *

 _Hello and welcome to my new story. I've always wanted to write a story about crazy Hanna because let's face it, there was quite the potential but PLL wasn't meant to be a sitcom. I hope that I can take you on a fun ride through nine months of exceptional state in our favorite couple's life._

 _XO, Zip_


	2. The second month

**oOOo Previously oOOo**

Another blue cross, a pink cross, a red circle, two parallel lines, several displays that read "pregnant" later, I accepted the relatively likely truth.

I was pregnant. Pregnant. Pregnant.

PREGNANT!

I continued dancing a jig and ended up making havoc of our bathroom. Aunt Phyllis' creamer plunged to the tiled floor and shattered into pieces… which only made me raise my arms into the air in triumph.

And then my brain started functioning properly again. I slowly sank down on the cold tiles and thought about the world we were living in… the dangers of living in Manhattan, the likelihood of another war in the Middle East and me… having lied to my own husband.

How could this happen? To me of all people?

* * *

 **oOOo The second month oOOo**

The rest of the day went by in a blur and I felt like somebody had put me into a trance. Fortunately, Caleb didn't come home before midnight, and when he eventually did, he just collapsed on the bed and fell asleep.

I, on the other hand, lay awake half of the night, brooding.

Maybe I wasn't pregnant after all? The tests said they were ninety-nine percent accurate. Maybe I was that one-percent person. If I took a total of, like, twelve tests, and all of which were positive… and all of which have a ninety-nine percent accuracy… what was the probability of me actually being pregnant? Oh, what the heck. I was never good at math. Caleb was the mathematician kind of guy, I should let him do the math part of this whole thing. I looked sideways and saw his features in the semi-darkness, feeling overwhelmed with gratitude. My tech genius… Somewhere down the road, he was going to be the one solving math problems for school with our kid…

By 3 in the morning, I felt completely exhausted from all the numbers and figures that were rallying around in my head, so I finally fell asleep. Four minutes later, I woke with a start: Emily! Emily was my only hope. Em knew all of my sins! Em knew all my hidden pockets of orange-peel skin. Em knew the truth about my take on sex with Caleb (which was better than I kept letting him on because, oh well, there was no point in making him get above himself, things could only go downhill from there!). Em had suffered through our breakup phase with me. She knew everything about me! That was… almost. I never told her about my desire to have children with Caleb this soon. And I never confided in her that I secretly stopped taking the pill. It never occurred to me to consult her about a huge decision like that.

But Em would know what to do now. Em would understand me, and when she'd hug me, I would know that everything was going to be alright. Plus, she used to be a business student so she was probably better at the applied statistics stuff than me. Why didn't I just call her the day before? Now I had to wait a few more hours until I could call her after church.

Since I was already up, I started my laptop and plugged in my headphones. You wouldn't believe how many movies about babies they used to make in the olden days… I worked my way through _Baby Boom_ , _Look who's talking_ , _Three men and a baby_ , and _For keeps_ , getting more and more horrified as the clock was ticking by. Scenes of helpless parents holding incessantly crying babies… relationships that were on the rocks because of incessantly crying babies… mommies on the verge of a nervous breakdown because of incessantly crying babies…

By morning, I was a bawling mess myself and I finally fell asleep again to the soothing sounds of the opening credits of _The hand that rocks the cradle_.

 **oOOo**

Caleb let me sleep in because it was the weekend and left the apartment early to go on a fishing trip upstate with his best buddy Toby. That gave me another whole day to think about my options.

Shit. Shit. Shit. Emily was out of town and on a business trip to Iceland. Wow, I never knew they had businesses in Iceland. Had they run out of teachers up there? Did they have to import them from the United States now? I tried to reach her phone three times and every time it seemed like they were speaking in a different language. The receptionist spoke English with an accent that I just wasn't able to make sense of, and every time I asked them to speak slowly, they answered something along the lines of "qwztiiwhz hwaakzzer."

Well, alright. I was a grown woman. I could do this by myself. I would simply wait for Caleb to come home from work the next day and then I would whip up something nice (not to worry, I didn't know how to cook, but of course, the excellent Italian restaurant down the street did and also offered take-out), light up some candles, put on romantic music. And if Caleb tried to seduce me on our dining table while fumbling around with the clasps of my bra, I would have simply said, "Honey, I'm pregnant. The pill didn't work." And then Caleb would have said, "Honey, darling, baby… that's fantastic news!"

Aaaaaahhhh! I had to admit my plan required a little bit of fine-tuning. It couldn't be all that hard. Millions of women have managed to tell their baby fathers before me.

I spent the entire Sunday in bed, watching movies that were as far away from the baby subject as possible. I was very proud of myself; I made it through _Scream_ and all of its three sequels all by myself – and I made a mental note to tell Aria that I'd found her doppelgänger in one of them! – before switching back to my chick flick watch list on Netflix or else I wouldn't have been able to be all alone in the apartment in the dark. Late at night, Caleb called to tell me that he'd had a few beers too many and would be staying in a motel with Toby. He was such a good and responsible husband!

The next day – Monday – I called in sick at work first thing in the morning. Some nasty form of migraine because it was that certain time of the month… A sure-fire way to prevent Frank from Human Resources from asking all sorts of nosy questions!

After hours of looking into the mirror and checking out my body for external changes or tell-tale signs like a bump or a blissful smile or stretch marks, I came to the conclusion: I looked just the same.

Later that afternoon, Caleb finally came home when I was laying on the couch, pretending to read a fashion magazine. I hadn't come any further in my deliberations on how to tell him the good news. On the plus side, I had calmed down significantly due to a Memorial Day sale at Bergdorf Goodman that I had just gotten home from. It had felt so good to buy some amazing summer dresses, especially considering I would have to sneak into Gear to Go Outfitters soon in order to find a good tent that fit me and my bulging body.

Caleb's voice blasted through the hallway. "Babe, did you get my message about dinner?"

Um… Wait, what message? I had forgotten about my phone when I returned from my shopping spree. "My phone's in the handbag behind the door. What did you message me for?"

All of a sudden, Caleb stood in the door frame, his face ashen and looking thunderstruck. I hated that look on his face. I knew we were about to have a huge argument. Sometimes I hated knowing him so well. That made it so much harder to think rationally about your next move.

Fuck. He knew. He knew everything. He seemed to have put on his X-Ray vision and now he was able to look straight into my womb...where he was sure to see... things.

I felt like I was dwindling away under his piercing gaze. He looked… hurt.

"Why are there dozens of rubbers in your bag?"

"Rubbers? What do you mean?" I had no idea what he was talking about. I always carried pencils and a rubber in my bag just in case I had a sudden flash of genius and needed to make a quick sketch or something when I was out and about in the streets of Manhattan.

But then it dawned on me. While I did think of hiding the pregnancy tests in an empty box of panty liners – which is an excellent tip for all you women out there, by the way, because that's a great hiding place that no men will ever snoop around in – I had completely forgotten to get rid of the purchases I had made at the pharmacy on Saturday.

"Rubbers. Condoms. Love socks. Willie warmers. You've got like fifty of them in your handbag." He took a box out and read, "Oh wow. Extra-large?" He took a few more steps and then he was right beside me. "That has to be some kind of stud you bought these for… Care to explain?"

That was a legitimate question. I had been taking the pill – oh wait, I had taken the pill – since the year one, and Caleb and I had both gotten ourselves tested for HIV and STDs pretty soon after we got together again in order for us to be able to have sex without condoms.

"I… uuuhhh…"

"I'm waiting."

Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. The way he was standing in front of me now with his arms crossed… He could have been an amazing lawyer, just like the ones on TV, winning each and every case just by way of intimidating the entire jury. Save that I hadn't killed anybody.

Actually, I had done the opposite.

On any account, I will be sentenced for life.

What was I supposed to say? _Caleb, I stopped taking the pill without your knowledge and without your consent and that's why I had to buy a pregnancy test which I didn't have the guts to do at the first pharmacy I went to, so instead I ended up buying those stupid condoms that you found in my bag?_

I didn't think that was a memory worth keeping so that we could tell it to our kids when they were old enough to hear it. I saw Caleb's right eyelid twitch nervously. Again, I knew what was coming. He always got that when he realized that he was being lied to. Shit.

I put on my sweetest smile and tried to exude innocence. I attempted telling him everything… But then I closed my mouth and put on another smile before I started explaining vaguely, "Uuuuuuhhh… they're not mine. You know, Melanie from work… you know her, don't you? Anyway, she hasn't had sex since forever. And the girls and I, we thought she'd get some if we bought her… you know?"

"I see. You bought condoms for her because she needs so many of them? Interesting." Caleb's eyelid was dancing the Salsa.

"Oh sure, babe! You're just not getting it right, that's all. You see, it's just like when you're trying to hail a cab on Broadway, but there's none available. And just when you're about to light another cigarette, there's that cab pulling over…. It's like Murphy's law, I think. Or like when you bring an umbrella for a walk and it won't rain, but when you actually forget to carry it around with you, it sure as hell does. Oh wait, that's not what I was going for. Anyhow… We just wanted to do something nice for her, thinking that we could… you know… invoke it or something."

He stared at me, blank.

"And I was the only one who had some time to spare, so I went to get them. Good thing you found them today. I totally forgot about them and I still need to wrap them so that I can give them to her when I see her again tomorrow."

Wheeeew, the twitching had stopped.

"Alright, knock yourself out. I still have work to do." At that, he left, and I set myself to work, wrapping up the condoms nicely, hoping Melanie, our spokesperson at CROWNE FASHION, would soon use her voice to represent someone else… or that Caleb would never pick me up from work again.

And then I remembered that Melanie was one hundred percent gay.

I decided to ask my friend Emily for some good excuses for Lesbians to buy condoms.

 **oOOo**

For the next two days, I knew that I was pregnant, but nobody else did and I wasn't able to tell anyone. Which was a really dense situation. Like having won the lottery but not being allowed to spend your million dollar prize.

Also, I was trying to quit alcohol which was really hard because that meant saying no to Céline's Mon Chéri chocolates at work that I was kind of addicted to. My co-workers started noticing and saying things like, "You already quit smoking, Saint Hanna. Are you only shopping at Whole Foods now, too?"

By Wednesday, Emily still hadn't returned from Iceland, where they apparently didn't have any paper to write down and pass on messages, and her phone was still directing calls straight to her voicemail. I really didn't want to wait any longer. Plus, Caleb had the right to find out first. After all, he had played a big part in contributing to my acute condition.

So tonight was going to be the night of all nights.

I cooked up some pasta – Whole Foods really did have an amazing range of canned pesto! – and instead of opening up a bottle of white wine I deliberately grabbed the bottle of apple cider before I proceeded to light some candles and put on Caleb's favorite music.

Caleb sat at the table, facing me. There were twelve neatly wrapped packages in a pile on his plate, and he eyed them suspiciously.

"Okay, what happened?"

"What do you mean, what happened? Nothing happened."

"It ain't my birthday today."

"I know."

"Oh no…," he looked at me with horror. "You broke my Jeep, didn't you? My prized Jeep… what did you do? Dent it again? How bad is it? Can it be fixed? Please tell me it's in the shop and they can fix it?!"

"Your car is fine!"

"Okay, okay. Good." His gaze was resting on my face, and I bet that he could see it. I bet he could see right through me and recognize that I had committed a felony. And he wouldn't blink until I had confessed everything. "Shit! It's my lucky sweater? You washed it and accidentally put it in the dryer and now it shrunk and won't fit me anymore but I will have to keep it until some day when we have a kid, they will fit into it because it was so fucking expensive that I could never give it to Goodwill?"

That must have been the lengthiest speech he had ever given to me. And boy, was he on to something…

"Your sweater is perfectly fine, too. And now open up the presents I got you." I looked at him in anticipation. Eventually, he started unwrapping box after box until all twelve test sticks lay on his plate, disclosed.

Clueless, he gaped at the plastic pile before his gaze traveled to me, then back to his plate and back to me once more. "What in the world is this?"

Shoot, that didn't seem to do the trick. But at least I knew now that he had never had a pregnancy scare with another woman before me or else he would have recognized the meaning behind those sticks. That thought was a good example of how female logic works.

"You don't recognize them?"

"I really don't."

In the semi-darkness of the room due to the candles, the wording in the display windows of some sticks wasn't perceptible. "Those are… they're… well, simply put they're test sticks to ascertain the concentration of carbon monoxide in the air. You know how you've been complaining about often getting a headache ever since we renovated the apartment? I thought we could just… try it out. You just let them lay around exposed for a few days and then you get your results."

"And you thought you'd wrap them up as a present for me?"

I decided to sit that one out and said nothing.

"And you wrapped all of them up individually!"

Tick tock tick tock.

Caleb was looking at me with sincere curiosity.

"Well, I thought…. I… uh… I thought." My mouth opened and shut like a fish underwater. And then I gave up and heard my croaking voice say, "I'm pregnant." At the same time, a torrent of tears emerged from my eyes.

My husband kept sitting opposite me, stone-still. Then he wiped off the dishware with an arm movement and came lunging across the table to strangle me.

I swear that was what I saw coming for a split second when in reality, he lunged forward to put his arms around me and dance around the dining table giddily.

"Pregnant? Pregnant? You're pregnant? Is this true? That's fantastic! Awesome! I'm gonna be a dad! And oh gosh, you're gonna be a mom! We're gonna be parents… you're pregnant… That's so... wow! We're having a baby… Whoa!" He abruptly paused and looked me in the eyes. "How could this happen?"

"I thought you knew all about the birds and the bees?"

"No, I meant, how could this happen with you being on the pill?"

Well, there it was. The one particular question that I'd been afraid of for days. What was I supposed to tell him? That I had only pretended taking care of birth control? That I hadn't even asked him for his opinion before making that decision?

There and then, it was my chance to wipe the slate clean and ease my conscience. So I told him, "I was on the pill, but do you remember how I'd had that stomach bug last month and had to throw up a lot? Well, and you know… or maybe you don't… but apparently, it says it right there on the package slip that the pill doesn't work as reliably if you're sick. I didn't find it there but who could when the print is so incredibly small, right? I don't remember the print always being that small so I think they changed that. Or do you think we could sue the manufacturers for malfunction? Not the pill, I'm not dumb, but for misinformation? Because… clearly… there's no way that anyone can read the slip properly now."

I'd run out of air and looked at Caleb eagerly, but he just shook his head.

"It's alright, Han! I mean it ain't the perfect time for me now with my budding startup and all. It may be another while before I sell anything and your job isn't paying all that well either. Money could be a little tight for a year or two. Then there's Christmas…," he paused to sigh.

"Um, it's May."

"I know, that's the problem. We have a hotel reservation in Hawaii for Christmas and New Year's!"

"We can still go," I tried to appease him.

"I don't know. Can we? Are you allowed to fly when you're pregnant?"

"I'm pretty sure I am."

"Then there's our apartment."

"What about it?"

"Where are we supposed to put the nursery? I really don't know how we-" He stopped and his eyes searched mine. There were still some tears glistening on my cheeks. Caleb plucked a tissue from the Kleenex dispenser on the sideboard and gently wiped my face. Then he sat down on a nearby chair and pulled me into his lap.

His hand sought out my stomach, and he softly caressed my skin. "Do you know what? It doesn't matter. We'll work it out. I think it's great."

"Really?"

"Uh-huh."

"You're really sure?"

"I insist."

And then he kissed me, and I wasn't able to tell whether I was starting to feel dizzy from the touch of his lips or the pregnancy.

 **oOOo**

So that was that. I was so proud of myself. Not only was I a mom-to-be, but Caleb was now a dad-to-be! I had finally told him the truth – well almost, but who was there to judge – and he seemed truly happy. Just like I'd sensed that he would.

A few days later, on a Saturday morning, Caleb and I were standing in the middle of Barnes & Noble, gaping at the vastness of the pregnancy and baby guide section before us. It was larger than the entire book store I used to shop at in Rosewood. Unbelievable! I marveled at a whole new world of colorful books that I had been missing out on until now.

Caleb skimmed the titles on the first bookshelf and pulled out the paperback edition of "The Uterus – Boon and Bane of a Muscle". In the meantime, I was looking for something that would help me through the next couple of weeks. I was kind of hesitant to ask my mom for advice and figured she'd be really excited and that once she'd start talking I'd never hear the end of it. Or she would act like she was the one having the baby. Either way, I preferred the short version of _pregnancy 101_. And looking at cute pictures of bellies and babies as a sideline was a definite plus, too…

But it was hard making a choice between all those titles. "Nine Hard Months Made Easy" and "Pregnancy – Natural Condition or Disease?" didn't have any pictures in them, so I quickly tossed them aside and picked a large, glossy coffee-table book called "Birth – Photos of A True Miracle". It had a ton of pictures. Colorful photos. Very colorful and realistic and… bloody. I felt a wave of nausea creep up inside of me. I wanted to give birth, I didn't want to be slaughtered!

It looked awful. Everything. And… what… in the world… was… that? Holy cow, what was that thing coming out of the woman? _Alien 5_? It was gross! So… gross…

Okay, I changed my mind, I didn't want to know the _pregnancy 101_ all that well. I liked surprises.

I flipped through a few more pages, feeling honestly startled about the fact that mankind hadn't become extinct millions of years ago. Was I supposed to go through that exact same thing in nine months' time?

No way!

Determined, I closed the book and shoved it back onto the shelf, convinced that there could never be a horror movie as horrific as what I had just seen in print. I would just have to ask someone else to do this job for me.

At that, a sweetly innocent voice approached me from behind. "Oh hi! What are you guys doing here? It's so nice to see you two together." I turned around and there she was: Renee! Shit! There are eight million people living in New York City, and I was standing face to face with Renee! She was an intern at Caleb and Lucas' small company, street smart as hell and working there for free! I knew she had a thing for my husband, but I also knew that he only adored her programming abilities. At least, that was what he kept telling me.

Caleb looked up from "The Uterus" and grinned at Renee. "Hey!"

Okay, if Renee found out that I was pregnant, the whole city would know, too, in a matter of minutes. I might as well have rented a billboard on Times Square! But I didn't want anyone else to know yet, and neither did Caleb. It was supposed to remain a secret amongst the two of us, our parents and possibly my friends until the little gummy bear in my belly was safe as I had just read that only twenty percent of all pregnancies made it past the three-month mark.

And so I found myself sweetly replying before Caleb had the chance to open his mouth, "Oh hey Renee! So good to see you, too. My co-worker Trish is expecting her first baby and we're looking for a present. How about you?"

It was funny. Being pregnant apparently came with great lying skills. Maybe it was time for me to venture into politics… And Renee's silly smirk revealed I had managed to sell my story to her.

Unless, that silly smirk meant something else. My gaze traveled down to her mid-waist. She had a noticeable bump. Not a I-had-too-much-for-breakfast bump like the one I was sporting that day, rather a full-on, impossible-to-misinterpret bump. I kept on staring.

"Yes, you figured it out right. I'm six months pregnant! Mike and I are over the moon. Can you believe that we only tried once? I've heard that some couples are not as fortunate as we were, waiting forever to conceive." At that, she blinked at both me and Caleb with a smile that seemed to be set in concrete. "If you're looking for a good pregnancy guide, I can recommend you one." She took a thin paperback from the bookshelf and handed it to me. "Here you go. It's very well written, without any fancy Latin words. So maybe you could get a few pointers from it, too."

Fifteen minutes later I had heard enough of her and so I quickly grabbed a book from the bargain table, pretending to have found just _the_ book I had been looking for, and begged Caleb to go to the checkout with me.

"999 Pregnancy Jokes and Quips?" he read the title, frowning.

"Yes! Trish's going to love it! Trust me!" I grabbed his hand and pulled him along. Renee followed suit, carrying a stash of books from the baby care shelf.

While waiting in line, Renee confidentially took me aside. "By the way, Hanna… no offense, how old are you? Twenty-eight? Thirty? I think it's past time you and Caleb started trying, you know. Don't wait forever… The clock is ticking. Tick tock, right? Your fertility is going downhill from here." She meaningfully furrowed her brow. "And remember, you're not getting any younger!"

If looks could kill, Renee's unborn child would have become an orphan at that very moment.

 **oOOo**

Damn, I was so tired all the time. In the mornings after I had showered, I wanted to go back to bed. At lunchtime, I wanted to take naps on my desk. At nights, whenever Caleb and I started watching a movie together, I usually fell asleep right after the opening credits had rolled by.

When I was late for work, which was often at the time, I had to resort to eventually making up names of people whose birthday party I had attended the day before. I was constantly feeling drained.

Since I still didn't own a good pregnancy guide, I spent my time at work browsing for information on the internet. While I didn't have to worry about infringing the company's internet policies due to a boss who had asked everyone to cover for him, I was concerned about being able to keep my job because of the pregnancy. That was when I decided to keep it a secret for as long as I could. And so I added shopping for girdles and spandex to my browsing history, though I was anxious how the baby would react. After all, I wouldn't have been too thrilled if our 600 square-foot apartment were suddenly only half that size.

 **oOOo**

Soon, it was time for my first OB/GYN appointment. I was feeling antsy as I sat in the waiting room with my handbag in my lap. I hated doctor's visits. They cost so much time and you were always at risk of going in feeling fit as a fiddle and coming out deathly ill.

Caleb had promised to meet me there in time for our first look at the baby. Unfortunately, he got stuck in traffic. I was on my own, and I was more saddened about him missing out on that experience than about me having no one to hold my sweaty hand for moral support.

There was a pile of magazines for the women's reading pleasure while they were waiting for their appointment. I saw a few parenting magazines, _InStyle_ and _Cosmopolitan_ … I intentionally snubbed all of those and pulled a copy of the _Financial Times_ out of my handbag. I loved looking like a sophisticated entrepreneur! Plus, I already knew almost every women's magazine because I had read them at work… I was basically taking some time off of the fashion entertainment _and_ looking predominant and incredibly good concurrently.

I had done some research on my way to the doctor's office. I had found out that there was a plethora of pregnancy tracking apps available. You simply entered the date of your last period and BAM, the app told you the expected date of birth and details about the current stats of the baby. I chose a cute app that compared the baby's size to fruits. According to that chart, my baby was currently the size of a pomegranate seed and I was six weeks pregnant.

Of course, I had no idea what the size of a pomegranate seed compared to as I hardly ever ate any fruits. I figured that if I looked at the app every day, I would have a daily reminder to eat a healthy snack. Clever, huh?

Hiding my face behind my newspaper, I took a look at the fellow Moms-to-be around me. There were bellies in all the different shapes and sizes. And I was the only one that didn't show at all. At that moment, I envied the other women. All, except one. There was a lady wearing a kaftan with a large flower print who I was completely fascinated with. Not because of what she was wearing – so three years ago! – but because of the gigantic size of her baby bump that was showing despite the fact that the designers had used at least ten bales of cloth to cover it! She looked like she was about to pop any moment.

When I wasn't able to hold it in any longer, I leaned over to her and whispered, "I'm sorry, but I'm new at this and I have to ask… How many are you having? Twins or triplets?"

But the woman just shook her head and proudly replied, "No, it's just one. A girl. Got eight weeks to go."

I stared at her with disbelief. I was pretty sure that if she'd had air in her stomach instead of a baby, one needle poke would have made her float nine feet above the ground. But before I was able to panic about whether I was about to look just like her in six months' time, I got called in for my examination.

Demeaning. Humiliating. Degrading. Those were usually the words that came to my mind when I thought of my pending annual check-up on the gynecological chair. But that day, I didn't care. I finally wanted to see my baby!

All I could see were two small dark grey spots in a mass of light grey blobs. That was it? Two dark spots, a big one and a small one? And the bigger one was just the yolk sac? That was… kind of disappointing.

Doctor Fink explained that everything was looking good. The baby had settled down properly and all we could do was wait, wait to see if it was meant to stay.

I folded up my legs and got off the chair. Then, I quickly scheduled a new appointment before Doctor Fink handed me an ultrasound picture: my baby's first portrait! I was suddenly feeling dazed, like walking on clouds… in five-inch heels.

As I opened the door to the hallway, I stumbled into Caleb. Before he could say anything, I lunged at him, fanning myself with the ultrasound picture as the words came tumbling from my lips, "Look, here! I'm so sorry you missed it! Take a look at this! It's our baby! Can you believe it? It's so cute! Isn't it the cutest thing you've ever seen? Lo-hook!"

 **oOOo**

Back at home, I framed the picture and hung it next to the TV. That way, I could pretend watching Caleb's boring man movies he called classic masterpieces with him while I was actually staring at the wonderful masterpiece that we created ourselves. It was also the very first abstract image which he allowed to grace our walls. And sometimes I caught him staring at it, too, with that distant, dreamy look that he normally reserved for every Jennifer Lawrence movie!

One late afternoon, during X-Men 3 — I did my usual routine of oooh-ing and aaaah-ing from time to time in order to keep myself from falling asleep — Caleb suddenly pressed the stop button of his Playstation, and Pat Sajak appeared on the screen. "We could go to the movies or out for dinner."

"We could go visit Ali and the twins. I haven't seen them in weeks and it's only a 45-minute drive."

"Or Landon and Brandon. I haven't seen them in months! Thirty minutes, max."

I knew he was going to say that. It was always the same battle of whose gay best friends were the funnest... or closest. And that day, he would have clearly won the battle. Ali was no fun being around with since Emily had moved to New York in the aftermath of their breakup.

"Or we could just, you know… stay here..." I snuggled up closer to him.

"Or we could do... this..." Caleb's hand dipped beneath my t-shirt and traveled across my naked back.

He started... doing... things... to... me... It was... amazing and lead to us quickly shedding our clothes. Even after so many years, there were those little moments between us when everything still felt like it did when we first got together... With a soft thud, we both landed on the floor in our close combat, almost undressed.

"Did they grow by any chance?" He asked as his hands encompassed my breasts. I opened my eyes and saw Pat Sajak's face, looking back at me from the TV screen. I didn't begrudge him for that view. I was pretty sure he didn't get to see something like that often anymore.

"l think so." I gazed down at his hands which felt better on my breasts than the best fitting bra in the world, and for the first time, they seemed to be having a hard time taking hold of the content.

"Wow. Well that's... awesome. I'm loving our baby already."

At that, Caleb dove lower to other regions of my body. However, my conscious thought resurfaced. There was a baby in my belly, and what the hell was I doing right now? Rolling around on the floor like a bitch in heat while my baby was there feeling it all with me... What kind of mother was I being?

"Caleb, please stop!"

"Huh?"

"l can't do this."

"You can't do what?" he mumbled while he was kissing my thighs.

"Don't you realize?"

"What?!"

"l'm a mommy!"

"Huh?" he asked again as he sat up. "Hanna! What's this all about?"

I pointed at the ultrasound picture next to Pat's wrinkly face.

"Yeah. You're pregnant. So?"

"So, that's the same."

"No, it's not. And even if it was… So what?" He disappeared from my view and tried nibbling at my right butt cheek.

"Mommies don't have sex."

"?" Caleb gaped at me, completely bewildered.

I vigorously nodded.

"Babe, don't you think you're exaggerating just a little?"

"No, not at all."

"But Han, come on. We haven't done it in forever."

Okay, that was true. Ever since I found out I was pregnant I hadn't made any advances. And for some reason, neither had he. Hm.

Caleb moved lower and started going for level three foreplay. Damn, he knew me so well and what was working and what wasn't.

But today, nothing was working for me. I got up.

"I'm sorry but apparently, you're unable to relate to the feelings of a mother. A mother ain't horny. A mother doesn't roll around on the floor in sexual innuendo. A mother's like... oh, I don't know what we're like but I bet there's something transcendental going on with me... something special, something mystical. You can call it what you want but there's some kind of miracle going on… inside of me. And we can't just... it's so small, you know... I can't handle... I'm sure _it_ couldn't handle you and me, right here on the floor… while watching from the inside... What is our baby supposed to think of us? We can't just do something as secular as an exchange of body fluids right here on our hardwood floor like wild animals."

Again, Caleb stared at me. And then he also got up and closed in for the kill. "May I remind you that our secular – is that what you called it? – exchange of body fluids was what started this whole thing in the first place? You're nuts, Hanna! You've gone totally bananas! I'm sorry but there's no other way to say it!"

I watched him as he quickly picked up his clothes. Wait, was he mad at me?

"I hope you and your maternal feelings are going to have a good night!" He grabbed the cuddly blanket and a cushion from our couch and disappeared in our office after slamming the door shut.

Shoot. That meant red alert. And me? I was going to have to raise my child as a single mom. I felt like crying. Or breaking something. Too bad we didn't have another hideous creamer in the back of one of our closets…

Sighing heavily, I grabbed one of the small pillows and threw it at the TV, yelling at the haggard baldhead opposite Pat Sajak, "It's _More bags for your buck_ , you stupid moron!"

 **oOOo**

Sex. Sex. Sex and even sevens, eights and nines.

It was 3 in the morning when I finally sunk into my mattress, feeling exhausted, yet utterly relaxed at the same time. I had just successfully seduced Caleb by every trick in the book. Makeup sex was always so amazing! Caleb had fallen asleep quickly afterwards and was quietly grunting next to me. The man could take three sleeping pills and barely accomplish a yawn, but a good orgasm would always knock him off for sure.

I laid my head down on his shoulder and closed my eyes. My final thoughts before I fell asleep kept revolving about the fact that not only was Hanna, the mom-to-be, but also Hanna, the hot piece of ass… Caleb's words, not mine.

 **oOOo**

The next day, before breakfast, I felt nauseous for the very first time. Morning sickness, I figured. The first indication of the life growing inside of me. Also, I had woken up to a massive load of messages from Emily, who had been bored on her red-eye flight home from Iceland. We texted back and forth for a while and agreed to meet up later.

When I entered our favorite coffee shop that afternoon, Emily was already sitting at our usual table with a Latte Macchiato in her hand.

"Hi, Hanna! So happy to see you."

"Emily! Hey! I'm so glad you're back. So, how was the Great White North?"

"Hanna, I was in Iceland, not Canada! And it was so amazing!"

I slumped into the other chair and propped my sunglasses up, waiting for the more detailed version of her travel story. Emily grinned at me. "Lots of business… lots of pleasure."

"How much pleasure exactly?"

Emily held up three fingers, prompting me to shake my head in admiration. Three girls in just eight days. She was turning into Super-Single. Ever since Emily's rash breakup with Alison, the speed at which she met up with potential transitional women had somewhat broken Olympic records. I didn't know if I was supposed to feel sorry for her or ask for advice on how to make the best use of social media.

"They were just dates, nothing more, nothing less," she hurried to explain herself. "And they weren't bad, but they weren't spectacular either. Icelandic women are not that different from American women, you know. Anyway, I don't think I'm ready for something new. I still miss Ali."

"You were the one asking for some space. Just... undo it. I know she's willing to give you a second chance."

"I'll sleep on it."

"Well, anyhow... I hope you two can work things out."

"So, what's new with you?" Emily suddenly changed the subject.

I shrugged and pretended I was studying the menu religiously when in fact I normally drank the same beverage everytime I was here. "Oh, nothing basically... Nothing really," I said eventually. "Same old, same old, you know. Caleb is working too much. I'm still not making enough money for my liking... Oh, wait. Here's a good one... My boss had us order red roses for his mistress the other day, and my desk buddy Annette fucked up and had them sent to his wife instead with the wrong name on the card and all. Holy cow, he went ballistic! And guess who had the pleasure of getting a call from his wife and having to straighten things out for him once again?"

"Ok, come on, spill it!" For some reason, Emily seemed nervous.

"Me! Once again, it was me who answered his phone. But I think I did a good job. Maybe I should stop trying to make my way into fashion and switch to writing. Or become a story teller for children," I mused while Emily started fidgeting with her teaspoon.

"Hanna!"

"What?"

"What's the tea? And stop feigning your interest in that menu. I already ordered a large frappuccino for you." She sat back in her chair and grinned at me.

Sometimes I really thought I should have become a lesbian and married her.

"l... uuuuh... I don't know."

She started looking me deeply in the eyes.

"You're having an affair?"

"Not necessarily."

"You dented his car?"

"No!" God, why did everyone think I was a bad driver?

"You spilled coffee all over Caleb's computer again and now he wants a divorce?"

I shook my head.

"You bought yourself another pair of shoes for 500 bucks?"

I shook my head again and paused for my inner drumroll. "I'm pregnant."

At that, Emily dropped her Latte Macchiato. There was a major mess on the floor and on the sides of our chairs, and when that was cleaned up again after what felt like an eternity, she gave me a stern look. "l can't believe it. How could that happen?"

"That's funny, that's exactly what Caleb asked me."

"So, how exactly did it happen?"

"l secretly stopped taking the pill last month," I whispered and held my breath.

"Are you mental?"

"Maybe."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Aren't you happy for me?"

"l would have brought you back to reason."

"l didn't want to be reasonal. I knew we always wanted to have kids one day. Kids make everybody happy, don't they? I mean you have kids, you know what I'm talking about..."

"Well, I am happy for you. I guess."

I had my doubts about that, and Emily seemed to notice it.

"l really am happy... for both of you! For all three of you. It's just... so new. That's all."

"It's still new for me, too."

We sat in our chairs silently for a while, and I couldn't help feeling like something had changed between us. And then another thought came to my mind. A disturbing idea... Maybe Emily was just jealous. I was carrying a planned child that was conceived in an act of love while she only got to donate her eggs to her girlfriend who then went on to carry the baby. Or maybe she envied the fact that my relationship with Caleb was still solid as a rock — he hadn't left me, had he? — while hers was... on the rocks, sort of.

Or maybe I should simply stop thinking badly about her.

"Nah, what the heck…" I suddenly heard her laugh. "Hanna, you're insane, but I love you! You've always been the crazy one out of all five of us." Emily chuckled and got up to round the table and hug me tightly. Then, we ordered a Hot Fudge Sundae for two.

We started scooping, cracking jokes and giggling just like we used to do when we were just teenagers. That book of pregnancy jokes had really come in handy.

Somehow, Emily confined herself to the fudge and I ended up eating most of the ice cream and all of the whipped cream. As I swallowed my final scoop of ice cream, I began to feel hot and cold at the same time. Emily regarded me carefully and let her spoon drop. "Are you okay? You look kind of pale in the face. No wait, green. Green's more like it."

Nope. I wasn't okay. Not at all.

I was feeling nauseous like hell. Like I needed to barf any second.

Pale… green… Was that the infamous pregnancy glow that everybody kept talking about?, I pondered and tried to breathe deeply in and out to keep my nausea in check.

Two minutes later, Emily and I got banned from the coffee shop after I had just caused a huge mess on the floor… for the second time within a half hour...

What had I gotten myself into?

… _to be continued…_


	3. The third month

**oOOo Previously oOOo**

"Hanna, you're insane, but I love you! You've always been the crazy one out of all five of us." Emily chuckled and got up to round the table and hug me tightly. Then, we ordered a Hot Fudge Sundae for two.

We started scooping, cracking jokes and giggling just like we used to do when we were just teenagers. That book of pregnancy jokes had really come in handy.

Somehow, Emily confined herself to the fudge and I ended up eating most of the ice cream and all of the whipped cream. As I swallowed my final scoop of ice cream, I began to feel hot and cold at the same time. Emily regarded me carefully and let her spoon drop. "Are you okay? You look kind of pale in the face. No wait, green. Green's more like it."

Nope. I wasn't okay. Not at all.

I was feeling nauseous like hell. Like I needed to barf any second.

Pale… green… Was that the infamous pregnancy glow that everybody kept talking about?, I pondered and tried to breathe deeply in and out to keep my nausea in check.

Two minutes later, Emily and I got banned from the coffee shop after I had just caused a huge mess on the floor… for the second time within a half hour...

What had I gotten myself into?

* * *

 **oOOo The third month oOOo**

Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh boy. It was almost sixteen hours later, and I was still feeling like crap. But I was no longer thinking I had eaten too much or gotten food poisoning. There was no more ice cream left in my stomach. I knew because I had seen every ounce of it either spread in a puddle on the floor of my formerly favorite café or flush down the toilet in the hours after.

On the other hand, I couldn't shake the feeling that my alarm clock wasn't going right. I had barely slept at all. lt was eight in the morning, but my weakened body kept insisting it was no later than midnight. Or had I missed another Daylight Savings time change? It was hard to keep track of that.

Caleb was in our bathroom, mumbling with toothpaste in his mouth that it was May and that the next time change wasn't until October, that the alarm clock was set to the correct time and that I was supposed to get up now.

"l can't."

"Hanna, it's quarter past eight already. You're going to be late for work again."

"l really can't get up."

"Why? What's wrong?"

"l just can't get up."

"Babe, you have to! I thought you had an important meeting with your boss today?"

"l don't feel good."

"Oh, come on. I'll make you some tea. That'll make you feel better."

"l don't feel like getting up."

"Alright, stay put. I'll make you that tea and bring it to the bed," he said while he was standing in the door crack, his mouth encircled by white froth. I could smell the peppermint scent of our toothpaste from the other end of the room.

Three seconds later, I was right by Caleb's side in the bathroom, kneeling in front of the toilet bowl. Amazing how much substance there still was in an empty stomach...

Good morning!

After a cold shower, I sat at the kitchen counter with my hair dripping wet, staring at the breakfast that Caleb had lovingly prepared for me. I was dead set on actually eating my French toast even though my stomach still felt like an automatic swing boat... attached to a rollercoaster.

Caleb looked at me with concern before he went on to bite into a sticky, overripe banana. Yikes! I couldn't believe it. What a nerve! My husband was a ruthless, cold-hearted, fruit-loving... un-pregnant man! Uuuuugh!

I ignored the dry, stale load of carbs on my plate and grabbed the yogurt instead that was already opened. Pineapple flavor, I read on the pot. I was on the verge of gagging. The smell was hideous, and I instantly checked the best-before date, but according to that, the yogurt was fresh. However, I decided somebody must have printed the wrong date and called upon my hand-eye coordination as I tossed the pot in the sink that was about six feet away. It landed on the floor at half-distance, and I couldn't have cared less.

Now, what was I supposed to eat? I let my gaze travel across the other food options before me. There was a granola bar, a small bowl of blueberries and a cup with a tea bag still dangling inside. I opted for the tea and brought the hot beverage to my mouth, thinking that chamomile tea was probably best for my troubled stomach. Carefully, I took a sip... and spilled it right out again. It smelled like chicken broth. Chicken broth with chamomile tea, actually!

Oh, now I got it!

Caleb was trying to poison me!

I stared at him as he innocently sipped from his coffee. He was having an affair! He had found a younger, blonder, more attractive girlfriend who wasn't carrying his baby and now he was trying to get rid of me...

Ooops, had I said that out loudly?

Caleb tapped his forehead. "Did I mention I love those pregnancy hormones? It's kind of starting to get funny. The tea is the one I found on our couch table this morning. I thought you knew."

Oooh, right. Emily had bought it with me the day before, after she had remembered what had helped Ali through pregnancy sickness. And that had been it?

I shoved the cup as far away from me as my arm could reach and flinched at my own cluelessness. And then I had an epiphany. I finally knew what I wanted to eat: a good old PB&J sandwich. Holy cow, yes! I could see it right before my eyes... soft, dripping slices of bread disappearing in my mouth... and actually staying in my stomach.

I needed them. I craved them!

"Where's the strawberry jelly?" I asked Caleb but didn't wait for his answer. Instead I got down from the barstool and squatted down wearing nothing but a bra and panties. He silently watched me, looking dumbfounded, He had every right to be, after all I must have made an awkward impression as I started ransacking the depths of every cupboard in our kitchen on all fours.

Damnit! Where was our stock of jelly? I was convinced we still had some glasses left somewhere in the kitchen.

Ha! There it was, right next to the shoe finishing! I knew it!

Appreciatively, I took a big bite from my sandwich... and spat it back onto my plate. The jelly tasted awfully, like mold. I looked at the glass again. _Best before December 2015. Happy Birthday! Love,_ _Auntie Phyllis._

I was frustrated, to say the least. The world was conspiring against me.

I grabbed a teaspoon and started scooping peanut butter from the glass while Caleb returned from our bedroom pulling a fresh button-down shirt over his head. It seemed like I wasn't the only one suffering from the consequences of morning sickness. And somehow that thought filled me with a feeling of justice and contentedness. After all, it was his baby, too, wasn't it?

 **oOOo**

Of course, I arrived late at work that day. My boss greeted me with a grunt when I walked into our office as everyone was piling out of the conference room after the usual Friday morning staff meeting. I didn't care. Given his situation, he wasn't able to hold a grudge against me anyway.

My thoughts kept revolving around one thing only: What was I supposed to have for lunch?

 **oOOo**

Lunch got cancelled later on after I hadn't been able to find a take-out menu with food that didn't make me gag just by looking at the pictures. I was hoping the best for the following day as I was sure I would be feeling better by then.

But I didn't.

The day after, I also wasn't feeling good.

The day after that, I still wasn't feeling good.

The day after that, I wasn't feeling any better either.

And the day after that, I was feeling even worse. I was feeling violently sick. I didn't know who had come up with the term 'morning sickness', but I was pretty sure it must have been a guy in an attempt to trivialize the situation of his wife. That little bit of household chores... That little bit of nausea... That little bit of lipstick on their collar...

I was feeling sick early in the morning and before noon and at noon and after noon and all evening and all night. All day, every day. Held hostage by a grey blob that was now the size of a raspberry.

In the meantime, I had added Doctor Fink to my speed dial. He had told me that it was totally common for pregnant women to barf up to five times a day. Okay, he might have put it differently but overall, I hadn't diverged from the norm and I would just have to endure my plight. Men!

The pregnancy guide Renee had made me buy a few weeks previously turned out more helpful. There were plenty of remedies suggested to help me cope with my nausea. So far, I had tried

valerian pills which only made me feel tired… even more than I already did…

homeopathy which actually made my nausea disappear for about two hours before it came back more severe than ever...

the special tea Emily had suggested which would have made me feel nauseous even if I hadn't already felt that way in the first place…

suppositories against vomiting which didn't make my sickness go away, but at least I was distracted for a while because I got a nice case of diarrhea. But for what it was worth… for once, I got to use the toilet the way it was meant to…

I really had no idea how other women managed to gain weight during their pregnancy. If things didn't improve soon, I was going to look like Cara Delevigne with a bisected football strapped to her mid-waist six months from now.

 **oOOo**

My baby! Oh my god, I had the most beautiful baby inside of me! The small grey blob from three weeks ago had grown significantly and gotten attachments that resembled arms and legs and a head. Using a little bit of imagination (or the loving look of a mommy-to-be), the fetus in my womb almost looked like a real person. It was a true miracle!

I was laying on the gynecological chair of horrors, watching wobbling grey masses on a flat screen TV that was mounted to the ceiling when suddenly a blurry shape formed and the ultrasound technician called out, "Oh, there you go. There's our little astronaut floating around."

Right in the middle, there was an even smaller blob, fluttering anxiously. That was the baby's heart beating like a drum, I was told.

My baby had a heartbeat!

I instantly began to cry, unrestrained… feeling completely overjoyed. It was so unreal. I was having a baby! A baby! I still felt like a kid at times when life was being unfair and really got to me.

My own heart started beating faster, and suddenly I was kind of tremendously grateful for being able to make this amazing experience, despite the constant nausea and throwing up. I decided I would humbly endure my hardship, knowing that it would be over after nine months and the whole journey would have been worthwhile in hindsight.

 **oOOo**

Oh my god! Yessss!

Ooooh myyyy goooooooddd! Yeeeeeesssssss!

Ooooooohhh yeeeessssss! Oooooohhhhh goooooddddd!

It was pretty embarrassing but every time I came during sex, I called out to God. I just never got around to stopping myself. Plus, it never seemed like Caleb had anything against it…

Feeling exhausted and dripping with sweat, I rolled off of him, cooling down from the most amazing orgasm. Ever since I was pregnant, every orgasm felt better than all the ones before, and I really wasn't exaggerating when I deemed them the best orgasms of my life. And Caleb had his fair share of that. I was so glad I had gotten over my totally hysterical "mommies-don't-have-sex" phase! It didn't bear contemplating what I would have missed out on…

Sighing happily, I claimed my reserved spot in Caleb's arms. "That was wonderful."

"Uh yeah."

That didn't sound too excited.

"Incredible!"

"It was alright."

Oh wow, that was kind of a bad review, wasn't it? But before I could apologize for my selfish behavior in bed, I had already fallen asleep. Again, I blamed the pregnancy hormones. It really wasn't my fault at all.

 **oOOo**

In week ten, I was convinced I was of some sort of Asian heritage. I had found out that the only food I was able to eat and digest was Thai takeout. Asian food became my lifesaver! While every pregnancy guide I had read and every pregnancy website I had researched had advised me to stick with toast or mashed bananas during times I was feeling nauseated, super-hot and super spicy foods were what kept me going those days instead. I made a mental note to ask my mom if the Marins, by any chance, happened to stem from an ancient line of Thai royalty. I had worked my way through the entire menu, ratcheting the degree of pungency up from day to day until I had reached the meals marked with four pepperonis on the menu without even doing so much as blink.

The other day, I was ordering my second breakfast at the _Siam City_. I was the only woman in the restaurant who wasn't in the company of at least one other person. I was all alone, looking like a god-damn single.

Never in my time when I really was a single living on my own in New York did I dare walking into a restaurant and ask for a table for one. It was kind of my pet peeve… being alone in a room full of people and everyone was staring at me and feeling sorry for me for being the kind of woman that no one would want to be with. Or like I was some sort of ogre with slime coming out of my huge green ears.

If it wasn't for the fact that I was currently double instead of single – even if you couldn't see it yet – I would have wanted to curl up and die. A woman was able to make as much money as a man or change the tires of her own Porsche all by herself or build every piece of furniture in her apartment; there was still the common sentiment that a woman could never have dinner alone at a restaurant. Welcome to the twenty-first century feminism!

But I didn't care at all. My baby wanted Tom Yam Gung and king prawns with red Thai curry and that was what they got. I struck a blow for every single woman in New York City… as a sensitive, pregnant cry-baby! Ha! The feminists in this city had nothing on me!

 **oOOo**

On my way back to the office, I passed by the GAP store on 34th Street and though I was expected back on time to attend a photo shoot, I suddenly found myself in the middle of the baby department. This was a brand new territory for me. I was overwhelmed just by looking at those tiny onesies from afar… All those socks about the size of the thimble I used in fashion school. So cute! So, so cute! Oh my god, those adorable infinitesimal dresses and matching hairbands… Cuuuu-huuuute!

But I hadn't reached the three-month milestone yet, and being very superstitious about it, I didn't want to jinx anything. And so I left GAP with two t-shirts and a pair of shorts that were likely to fit me again in no more than ten years! If any…

Alright, that was a lie! I did buy a pair of teeny-tiny hooped baby socks. But they didn't really count now, did they? They barely fit over my big toe and if you didn't know any better you'd think they were cozies for quail's eggs.

 **oOOo**

"I'm fat."

"No, you're not. You're pregnant."

"But I'm fat."

"Pregnant!"

Cue the whiny voice. "But I look fat."

"'You look pregnant."

"l look fat. If I looked pregnant, I wouldn't have this humongous roll of fat at the waist but a nice curvy belly bump... and everybody would know that I didn't just eat too many Thai shrimps."

"Instead they'll know that you fucked once too many."

 _Dingdingdingding._ End of round five-hundred-sixty-six. Again, Caleb came out as the winner.

Still, I had the feeling I was somehow looking a lot fatter. And above all, I had lost my fab waist!

I was standing in front of the floor-length mirror, eyeing myself suspiciously while Caleb spent his afternoon reading online gothic comics and pretending to be working. Every time I caught him snicker, he claimed being amused about his co-workers programming mistakes. But he couldn't fool me! My poor little tea junkie... Aunt Phyllis had supplied us with plenty of hideous household items after our wedding, but that one time when she'd sent us a new shiny tea pot that was actually a little mirror when looking at it from afar at the right angle, she had chosen well.

"Caleb, why don't you care about what me and our baby are going to look like?"

"Han, please! I'm working."

"Then take a look at me for just a second and tell me that I'm not looking fat." Caleb's focus remained on the screen in front of him. And was that a lip-bite?

"l told you already."

"You told me that I looked pregnant." I had barely finished the sentence when I heard him sigh loudly.

"Hanna, you do not look fat. There, I said it."

"But do you really mean it?"

Another deep sigh, followed by the soft thud of the laptop being closed. I had his full attention now.

"By the way, when were you planning on telling our moms?"

Seriously, how had this man not become a lawyer? He was always so good at changing the subject and making other people feel like they owed him an explanation.

I suddenly found the state of my knees very interesting and wondered if they had always been that flabby. When I dared gazing in his direction again, I caught his mischievous smile as he knowingly opened up his laptop again in slow motion. And somehow I knew that no matter what would happen, I had made the right decision to become his wife.

In a flash, I was with him, squeezing my bulging waist and the rest of my fat body between his chest and the edge of our dining table to sit down in his lap and trying out my latest invention called the 'I'm-a-pregnant-lady-carrying-your-child-please-help-and-protect-me-pretty-please' look. I had successfully tried it out before which had resulted in Caleb making me breakfast in bed every morning. "Couldn't you...? Maybe...? Just this once?"

"l think it's about time we tell our mothers. I'm going to give mine a call, and you're going to call yours."

"Oh, that's easy for you to say. You've got a mother who lives three thousand miles away. She's not going to come over and smother you with love until you end up laying on the couch all day and having her wait on you hand and foot for the rest of the pregnancy."

"Sounds perfect. Where do I sign up?"

"Caleb!"

"What?"

"Ever since they cut her hours at the Radley she's been looking for a new project to devote all her being to. And guess who she'll be going at? Me! Us! We're going to be her new project to focus on!"

"So what? What's to say against having her pamper you if she enjoys doing that?"

I thought long and hard about an answer to his question, but failed to come up with a reasonable one. My mom was great! Before Caleb and I became an item, my mom and I were partners in crime, sort of, always having each other's backs. And I was pretty sure she would be a cool grandmother one day.

Besides, it wasn't like there was any way for her to move in with us anyway. She had her own place in Rosewood, and there was no room for her to sleep in our apartment. Unless my mom had become a couch surfer lately.

The long silence that had emanated in the room prompted Caleb to put on a grin. He sheepishly picked up my phone and handed it to me before turning his attention back to his own project in front of him.

Pah. Easy for him to laugh at my indecisiveness. His family was strewn all over the world. His biological mom was in California with her new husband. His step-brothers had been sent away to private school in Seattle. His biological father had lived in Rosewood for a while, but now he had settled down in Ireland with a hippie woman named Coral Flower. And there were no connections whatsoever to any of the foster families that he had stayed with during his childhood. The last time he had his entire family around was his twenty-first birthday... they'd spent two hours together at the Frequent Traveler Lounge at O'Hare Airport in Chicago. Yet he never complained about his family's situation.

I looked at the black screen, my thoughts revolving around whether and where I would reach my mom at that time of the day. In her office? In Yoga class? At the Target check-out? In the bathtub, crying into a glass of Merlot because someone had axed her position due to her age and sex?

Sighing, I dialled her number. It was ringing... once... twice... Maybe she was in the shower at the gym... I could try and call her again tomorrow. Or the day after tomorrow. Or...

"Ashley Marin speaking, hello?"

"Shit."

"Pardon me?"

"Oh, hi! Hey mom! It's me. Hanna. I just bumped my toe against the couch. Ouch, that hurts." I started jumping around on one foot to make myself sound more gullible.

"Hanna, hey! I didn't see it was you. Why are you calling my landline?"

Maybe because chances were higher that you wouldn't answer the phone...

"Oh, did l?" I muttered innocently. "Must have been by accident."

"It's great to hear your voice. Feels like it's been forever since we talked."

"Mom, it's only been a week. Seven short days." And back then I somehow forgot to mention the news.

"Seven long days, baby!"

"I've been pretty busy, you know with my job and all..." I closed my eyes and bit my lip as I heard a soft whimper at the other end of the line. Damn, why did I just say that?

"l miss my old job," she sobbed. "Ten-hour weekend shifts at the reception are like a punch in the face, Hanna. The face of an old, single woman whose only daughter has long left the loving nest of her childhood home."

Suddenly, I knew exactly what to do.

"Mom, I'm having a baby."

An eerie silence occurred. For a second I thought my mom had become unconscious.

"Mom? You're going to be a grandma!"

Through the phone, I heard a distant thud and really started to worry. "Mom? Are you still there?"

"Really?" came her whispery voice eventually.

"February 27 is my due date."

"I'll be in New York in two hours. Don't move! Lie down and get rested. I'm going to take care of everything."

Yup, that was exactly what I had been worrying about.

 **oOOo**

It took a lot of guts and all my power of persuasion – a vacation, we were planning on going away for a few days… and technically, we could, I guess – to talk my mom out of packing up her belongings and driving up to New York that day. I hadn't had a creative output like that in a while. My boss would have been proud of me and my communication skills.

But my mom was going to come by, a.s.a.p. That I was sure of.

However, I wasn't really sure what that thing called Chorionic Villus Biopsy was – much less how it was even pronounced – that I had made an appointment for because my OB/GYN had had just as much power of persuasion as me.

I knew I was nowhere near the critical age at which the chances of an awry development of the fetus were heightened. But I agreed to have this procedure done anyway because it was always good thinking to be prepared for everything, wasn't it?

Caleb and I (or rather me and Caleb because he didn't really care about that issue) had decided that we would want to know in advance if our baby had any genetic defects. I hated the idea of our little fig possibly being defective. It was supposed to be a perfect fruit.

And so that was how I came to lie down on a stretcher at a special clinic on a Thursday afternoon, watching the ultrasound technician busy herself with preparing the machines and screens and gel tubes for my examination.

Whoa, I was literally stunned by the sheer size and number of buttons of that ultrasound machine. It looked like a Porsche compared to the bicycle type of ultrasound apparatus that my OB/GYN had in his office.

There was a giant monitor hanging on the ceiling above the stretcher. Toby and his big screen TV had nothing on the viewing experience that Caleb and I were about to get. I somehow felt like I was in a comfortable loveseat at the movies, and it was only a matter of time before a nurse came by to hand us two bottles of light Coke and a large pint of savory popcorn.

Moments later, the lights went out. And instead of movie trailers and food commercials, something appeared on the screen above our heads, levitating in a sea of black, accompanied by classical music. — "It's Bach. Most women feel very relaxed when Bach is playing in the background!" — Our main movie had begun promptly! They could have played Metallica or that yodeling boy from Walmart on a loop, I couldn't have cared less. I was mesmerized by the image of our child from the very first second...

The thing that used to look like the tip of a needle had actually transformed into the shape of a real baby. There were arms and legs, a head with a small button nose. Our baby was floating like an astronaut in a galaxy far far away. The surrounding blackness of the womb represented the endless blackness of the universe, interspersed with oodles of little stars made of white noise... The umbilical cord looked like an oxygen tubing between the astronaut and its mothership. Even the movements were similar: a constant tossing and turning beyond zero gravity. For one second I pictured them waving at me. My little astronaut... still sexless, but that was a whole different story!

Caleb who happened to join me for a doctor's appointment for the first time and who hence why saw the baby live on TV for the very first time, kept wiping his eyes dry with the sleeve of his shirt. I figured he was having an okay time, maybe slightly better than watching a new Avengers movie or maneuvering through a new level of Fortnite... At least to me, seeing his happy tears was better than Christmas and a Prada blowout sale on the same day!

But then I saw the biopsy needle.

It was like two feet long and very... very sharp! I spontaneously decided that I could live with whatever result the test would have come back with. Nobody would ever get to poke me with a needle like THAT. Nobody would get to destroy the wonderful image of my astronaut and their breathing apparatus on screen by poking a needle into my belly. There were no needles in space. At least, not that I was aware of. And my astronaut would get to see the light of the earth, no matter what!

Afterwards, Caleb and I sat in a corner booth at an unfamiliar, dark and shabby café, rewarding ourselves with a plateful of greasy donuts and chunky cupcakes, sickly sweet Cronuts and never-before-seen Cragels, afforded by the money we had just saved on an unnecessary medical procedure in order to rely on our good luck.

And figuring by the fact that neither of us got food poisoning or a urinary infection at that place in the aftermath, we were probably good to go...

… _to be continued…_


End file.
